Transactions of the London Horticultural Society. 403 



auchans, and one muirfowl-egg pear were planted ; they were what are gene- 

 rally called ' dwarf maiden plants,' All these trees showed fruit in the 

 third year, and bore a beautiful crop in the fourth year after they were 

 planted, and the crops produced every year since have been astonishing. The 

 surface of this border every winter gets a dressing of cow-dung, which is dug 

 in about 8 in. below the surface. 



" In 1822, another border was similarly prepared by mixing up the rubbish 

 of an old wall with the soil of an old border, to which no dung was added, 

 lest it might make the soil too rich; but this Mr. Drummond has since 

 regretted, as he finds that where stones and rubbish are mixed with the soil, 

 there is no danger in making a free use of rich manure. In the spring of 1823, 

 French pear trees were planted in this border, and they afterwards came as 

 early into a bearing state, and continued to be as productive, as the trees at 

 the cottage garden. 



" By thus mixing stones and rubbish with the soil of the border, and form- 

 ing the border above the subsoil, we are able to bring French pear trees into 

 a bearing state at a much earlier period of their growth, and to render some 

 varieties of these trees, hitherto considered as shy bearers, not less productive 

 than those of the more common kinds. 



" Mr. Drummond next points to the analogy between his method of form- 

 ing borders for pear trees, and that employed when plants are cultivated in 

 pots or boxes. In the latter, pieces of potsherds, shivers, or other sub- 

 stances, are laid at the bottom of the pot to drain off superfluous moisture, or 

 are sometimes mingled with the soil of the pot or box, when they are of large 

 size, else the fibrous roots of the plant would probably perish during the win- 

 ter, when vegetation is suspended, l^ovi the roots of wall-trees, in an arti- 

 ficially prepared border, are in a very similar state, if the soil be deep and no 

 stones or rubbish mingled with it ; for a great body of fine earth, without such 

 admixture of stony substances, is too retentive of water during the winter 

 months, which proves very injurious to the fibrous roots of trees in our cold 

 damp climate. 



" Many opportunities of lifting the roots of trees, in borders differently 

 formed, have afforded illustrations of the foregoing facts ; for those roots 

 raised from borders where the soil was mingled with stones and rubbish have 

 presented a dense mass of fibrous rootlets ; whilst others, which had grown 

 in deep and rich borders without such admixture of stony substances, have 

 exhibited only long naked roots, more or less destitute of fibrous appendages. 

 In the rubbish borders, the fibrous rootlets might be seen to seize, as it were, 

 on some substances of the soil in preference to others; pieces of lime-plaster, 

 or mortar, were generally preferred, being often found enveloped in a mass of 

 such rootlets ; next to these, pieces of whinstone and brick were selected by 

 the rootlets ; coarse gritty sandstone they seemed to reject, but to like the 

 fine white sandstone which the roots of heaths are so fond of. 



" In connection with this search after stony bodies, Mr. Drummond men- 

 tions some curious facts respecting the directions which roots take in borders 

 formed, in part, of paving stones. If such stones be laid at the bottom of 

 the border with the view of preventing the roots striking into the subsoil, the 

 trees will soon send down their roots until they come in contact with the pave- 

 ment, over the surface of which they will then spread themselves in every 

 direction. Should their extremities not be able to penetrate the mortar or 

 clay in which the stones are embedded, they will, after a time, push out beyond 

 them, and then, dipping down, take an inverted position and extend beneath 

 the pavement. On the other hand, if the stones be laid on the surface of the 

 border instead of its bottom, the roots then seem to strike upwards, and 

 spread along the under surface of the stones. In both cases the stones seem 

 to attract and retain moisture, and, during the vegetating season, the roots 

 strike towards them in order to obtain it ; but with this difference in the 

 ultimate result : — when the stones are laid at the bottom of the border, the 

 principal roots are detained there, and their fibrous rootlets are more or less 



